


Shatter

by Kryptodrakon



Series: Whumptober 2018 [1]
Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Gen, Mentioned Ardyn Izunia, Noctis Whump, Prompt Fill, Trash Jesus Strikes Again
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-02
Updated: 2018-10-02
Packaged: 2019-07-23 19:16:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,635
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16165223
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kryptodrakon/pseuds/Kryptodrakon
Summary: Whumptober Day 1: Stabbing"The last thing he needed was for someone to realize it was the crown prince running around like a headless chickatrice."Noctis is running late for dinner with his dad and bumps into someone with an unexpected consequence.





	Shatter

He’d forgotten, of course he had, that Ignis was tied up in exams and he needed to make his own way to the Citadel for dinner with his father. By the time Noct had remembered it was too late to call for a car, and the idea of calling ahead that he’d be late, hearing that note of exasperated disappointment in Regis’ voice when their already precious little time together was cut short by his own ineptitude, well he couldn’t bear it.

 

Which was how he found himself sprinting down the streets of Insomnia, weaving his way through the evening crush of people as fast as he could manage. He’d had the foresight to throw on a knit cap and jacket, which was as much to obscure his identity as to protect him from the cold, and so despite the hour and the crowd he managed to draw very little attention as he went. The last thing he needed was for someone to realize it was the crown prince running around like a headless chickatrice. He’d already be in enough trouble with Ignis for foregoing any kind of guard for the sake of expediency without the additional need for damage control if his image was harmed by his headlong dash up the main thoroughfare.

 

Fall in Insomnia brought the start of a string of official holidays, one on top of another, parties and festivals and street fairs and every single one of them bearing different precedents for the royal family’s attendance and participation. The end result was that Noct and his father hardly saw each other until the winter solstice. The few evenings they were both free were a precious commodity until the slowdown after the new year. He couldn’t miss this dinner.

 

Noctis had only just congratulated himself on making good time when he rounded a tight corner, and then all he saw was a flash of red hair and a floral coat before he collided with a pedestrian hard enough to spin him around and slam his shoulder into the stone wall of the bank building. Clutching a stitch in his side, the prince inhaled and looked up, but the apology died on his lips as he looked around and realized whoever he’d run into was already gone. “Figures,” he mumbled, wincing at the throbbing ache under his hand. Perhaps they’d hit him hard enough to crack a rib. Ah well, he’d had worse.

 

He peered around the corner while he caught his breath, but didn’t catch another glimpse of whoever it was he’d collided with. He shrugged it off--if they’d taken off so quickly they couldn’t have been hurt--and picked up a steady pace again, winding his way back into the crowd as he headed for the Citadel gates.

 

By the time he stopped, panting, in front of the gate guard, the ache had grown considerably. Definitely at least a cracked rib. Noctis winced as he reached up to peel off the cap and realized with a start that he knew the fur pauldron and blue scarf in his field of view. “What’d you do _now,_ Nyx?”

 

“Quit being nosy, Highness,” came the easy retort, “or I’ll keep your ID and tell the crownsguard you’re an imposter.” Ulric’s smile was genuine, but when Noct met his eyes he didn’t miss the concern that lay underneath. “You okay?”

 

Noct gestured at his ribs. “This? Yeah. Just bruised; ran into someone on my way here, but they were built a little like Gladio I guess because I bounced off rather violently. Nothing’s broken, I promise.”

 

The glaive twisted his mouth into a frown, but must have decided not to pursue the issue in the face of Noct’s obvious hurry. “Well, enjoy your dinner, Your Highness. Maybe put in a good word with the old man so I can get back in the field?”

 

Noctis laughed as he jogged down the long drive, skirting the roundabout and starting up the steps three at a time.

 

That, it turned out, was a mistake. It took him a split second too long to react when he felt the toe of his boot catch the edge of a stone riser, and the next thing he knew he struck a step exactly where the ache in his ribs was the worst. Something snapped inside him, and Noct’s vision whited out as he bit into his cheek to stifle the scream.

 

He wasn’t sure how long he stayed there just trying to breathe, waiting while the ripping agony in his chest returned to a manageable throb before he picked himself up carefully and took the rest of the stairs into the building at a much more sedate pace, one arm wrapped around his middle.

 

It was stupid, he knew, to continue to pretend like nothing was amiss. If his rib hadn’t been cracked before it _definitely_ was now. Every time he moved it felt like shards of white hot metal were shredding his insides. Noctis glanced at his watch; if he hurried, he could stop in his old room and take a couple ibuprofen. He was almost positive there would still be some in the medicine cabinet; Ignis kept most of the basic nonperishable necessities stocked in case he needed to stay the night for any reason. Resolved, he shambled past the reception desks, giving the woman behind the counter a vague wave when she smiled in his direction, and deposited himself in an elevator.

 

As if luck would have let him have what he wanted. He nearly laughed out loud when the door opened three floors up to reveal his father of all people standing there.

 

Regis looked somewhat taken aback by his son’s disheveled appearance. “Noctis?”

 

“Hey dad,” Noct said sheepishly, reaching for the back of his neck and then aborting the maneuver with a wince when it pulled at his injured side, letting his fingers wrap white-knuckled around the rail instead. “I was just on my way to meet you for dinner. Sorry I’m late.”

 

The king smiled fondly. “Well, seeing as how I am also late, perhaps we might consider it even.” He stepped into the lift beside his son, resting his hands on his cane as they both watched the floor indicator tick up. “I’m glad we were able to find time to eat. How go the preparations for the harvest festival?”

 

“Ah, well, you know. There’s never a shortage of volunteers for the zombie run, but there always seems to be the problem of more zombies than runners.” Not that Noct blamed anyone; he’d rather douse himself in stage blood and theatrically pretend to eat brains than run a 5k too. His ribs gave a painful throb as if to remind him exactly why that was. “I have the easy job. That festival’s been going on so long it practically plans itself.”

 

“Even so,” Regis told him, “Ignis has been keeping the council apprised of your progress, and I’m proud of the initiative you’ve taken. It should be quite an event.”

 

He might have glowed a little under the praise. Or it was just sweat from his sprint across the city. Either way his father’s approval felt like a small sun inside his chest, radiating warmth through his limbs.

 

Noctis kept pace with the king as they exited the elevator and made their way down the corridor. For once he was grateful for the slower speed, surreptitiously holding onto his abdomen to try and minimize the jarring impact of his steps. He was beginning to think the rib might be well and truly broken, the ache growing well past what he’d expected if it were merely cracked and hedging into the realm of intolerable, grinding around his insides. He was starting to feel nauseous, with a taste in the back of his throat like he’d licked a penny. _Just make it through dinner, take some pills, you’ll be fine. You can do this._

 

He sat stiffly in the chair the footman pulled out for him and asked for a glass of water, feeling suddenly inexplicably thirsty and hoping the liquid would rinse the taste from his mouth. He was well aware that his father was watching him across the table, his long fingers steepled beneath his bearded chin and a frown on his face. “Are you ill?” he asked his son quietly.

 

Noct was certain his smile wasn’t very reassuring. “Yeah… uh, no. I’m fine. Just… tired.”

 

“Noctis…”

 

Uh oh. His dad hadn’t used _that_ tone in a couple years at least. “I… ran into someone on the way here. Or, ran _over_ them. It’s no big deal, I got a little jostled, that’s all. It’s nothing.”

 

“It isn’t.” And gods, there it was, the tone of benevolent authority he couldn’t refuse. Regis stood, leaving his cane dangling over the arm of the chair and limping around the table using the chair backs as support. He crouched beside Noct’s chair, dragging it around so his son was facing him. “You’re sweating.”

 

“I ran here. Forgot Ignis had exams and it was too late to call a car.”

 

Regis pursed his lips, but chose not to pursue that particular avenue for the moment, which Noctis was grateful for as he hadn’t had time to fabricate a reasonable defense for it yet. “Where were you struck?”

 

Noct thought about refusing, maybe getting up and leaving, but the room was spinning lazy circles around them, his stomach was rebelling inside him, and his chest felt tight and heavy. Instead of answering, because the last thing he wanted to do was hurl on his dad, he gestured to his side. He couldn’t fully stop the whimper that escaped him when Regis helped him maneuver out of the sweatshirt he was wearing, or the quiet swear when his dad lifted the fabric of his dress shirt. “Gods, Noct, that’s hardly nothing.”

 

“I…” When had he been _stabbed?!_

 

The wound wasn’t much to look at, no more than an inch wide and thin as a papercut, just under his last rib and weeping a tiny runnel of blood. If it hadn’t been for the vivid bruising spreading up and down his side, he might never have noticed it at all. “I didn’t realize…” He felt it an instant before it happened, bubbling sickly in the back of his throat, and he only just managed to turn his face away from his father before the water made a reappearance tinged an alarming shade of red.

 

His father’s hand on his neck grounded him as he heaved blood onto the priceless rug beneath his feet. Regis was speaking into his phone, his voice clipped with urgency but surprisingly level, and Noctis latched onto his tone as his fingers tangled in the front of his dad’s raiment, the gold chain warm against his chilled fingers. He felt calloused palms slide against his cheeks, the king turning his face so their eyes met, calm hazel and wide, terrified blue. “Breathe, Noct,” Regis murmured. “Help is on the way, but I need you to stay awake. Keep talking to me. Start with why you thought it was a good idea to wander the city alone?”

 

“Wasn’t wandering,” Noct mumbled. It was getting harder to keep his eyes open, sagging in his dad’s grip. He whimpered pathetically when something grated inside him as his weight shifted forward. “Guess ‘m not… cut out to be by myself. Point taken.”

 

Regis groaned. “Puns, Noct?”

 

“You said… keep talking. Didn’t say it had to be… sharp conversation.”

 

“Astrals, Noctis.”

 

The breathy little laugh was lost when the medics slammed into the room, and Noct chose that moment to drop into Regis’ arms in a boneless heap.

 

* * *

 

 

He felt floaty, and everything smelled like antiseptic and the color white, and Noct realized with a start that he was in the hospital. Again. He opened his mouth to ask what had happened, but what came out instead was a jumble of nonsense followed by a rasping cough and he winced at the soreness in his throat. He sipped gratefully when a bendy straw poked him in the lip, and heard his father’s sigh of relief an instant before the king’s free hand carded into his hair. It felt nice, and Noct hummed as the water cup disappeared. “I feel less like a semur skewer,” he said quietly, turning his face toward his father’s chair.

 

Regis chuckled. “That would be the drugs.”

 

“What happened?”

 

“You went into shock, which ended up being most fortunate, under the circumstances.” The king rubbed his temples with his free hand, then twisted it to pick up a dagger off the tray beside the bed. The blade was impossibly thin, tiny backward serrations catching the light that danced along the razor edge from a crack in the window blinds. “The Empire has deployed these against the Kingsglaive before. They’re designed to break off inside the body. You shattered it when you fell on the stairs and a piece of it nicked your spleen, which sent you into shock from blood loss.”

 

“So my lack of coordination saved the day?”

 

“More or less.”

 

Noct laughed, wincing when the motion pulled at his abdomen. “What’s the damage?”

 

“Most of the damage was repairable once the pieces of the blade were removed, but you’ve lost a lot of blood, and you will be sore. A week’s bed rest and a few weeks of light duties while you build your strength back up, and you should have no lasting ill effects.” His expression brooked no argument, and Noct suspected he’d already relayed the orders to Ignis, who was more than likely beside himself and fully prepared to go full mother hen on him as soon as he was allowed. The prince grimaced good-naturedly at the mental image of his advisor winding up for a lecture on being a bonehead and running unsupervised through the city, getting himself stabbed.

 

He must have said part of his thoughts aloud, his tongue loose with the drugs in his system, because his father laughed, _really_ laughed, and the sound was magical in its rarity these days and almost made it worth getting stabbed. Once he’d sobered, Regis threaded his fingers through his son’s with a sigh. “Do you remember anything about your attacker?”

 

Noctis pressed his lips together, trying to focus on his memory through the haze of medication. “Not much. All I saw was red hair… flowers, maybe? Ow… dad… dad my hand.”

It took a moment, and Regis suddenly wrenched his hand away from where he’d been gripping Noct’s far too tightly, his knuckles white. _It couldn’t be…_

 

“Dad what is it?”

 

Regis took a deep breath, forced his roiling emotions down, and shook his head. “Nothing, my apologies.” The prince didn’t look convinced, but his stern expression was somewhat less effective when his eyes began to droop. The king smiled gently at him. “Sleep, my son. I’ll be here when you wake.”

 

“‘S good. Don’t want Iggy to stab me again when he finds out I didn’t take a car.”

 

His chuckle was only a little forced, but Noctis was already asleep, and missed the note of falseness to it. As he tangled his fingers once more in his son’s raven hair, Regis glanced up at the ceiling, toward where he knew the crystal sat high above them. _Divine plan or not,_ he thought bitterly, _if I ever get my hands on Ardyn Izunia, there won’t be need of a chosen king, because I’ll strangle the life out of him._

 

He felt the brush of Bahamut against his mind as he gazed at Noct’s sleeping face, and even though the gods were difficult at the best of times to interpret the brief presence there felt an awful lot like laughter.

**Author's Note:**

> Technically this is late but I swear I finished writing it ten minutes before midnight so I'm gonna call it a win. It's rough, it's not that great, but it's here.
> 
> I already know I'm not gonna be able to do all 31 days of Whumptober. As it stands I'm full-time momming but also working 2 other jobs, not including commissioned art. It's a LOT and it's taking up a lot of my free time. But I enjoy the heck out of writing whump, so I'm gonna do my darndest to get as many of these as I can. 
> 
> As far as I know the idea for this blade is... highly unrealistic, but whatever magic and gods both exist in Lucis so suspension of disbelief should extend to weird plot-driving knives okay?
> 
> This was more or less an excuse for bad stabbing puns and hurt Noctis, because who doesn't need more of that?
> 
> Any and all mistakes and run-on sentences are mine, as always.


End file.
